After providing the boys with the time and whereabouts for their obligatory exercise, Amaya Sensei took off, leaving them sitting on the bench, utterly crushed. Following her departure, they sat in silence for a few minutes before Reito shot to his feet.

“The way I see it, based on Amaya Sensei’s words, we’ve got three options,” he announced, raising his right hand with a finger extended, rousing Kazuki and Yuji out of their respective reveries. “One, we can do as she said; forfeit her test and give up becoming ninja—”

“No way,” Kazuki interrupted with less vigor than he might normally have mustered in protestation of such a suggestion.

“—Two, we take her test, knowing, as she explained, that we’re probably heading back to the academy.”

Yuji’s head drooped at this second unfavorable option.

“Or three…” said Reito, raising a third finger. “We disregard Amaya Sensei’s whole statement.”

Kazuki and Yuji looked at Reito with matching expressions of confusion.

“You mean to say we should do our best and try not to feel bad about it?” asked Yuji.

Reito shook his head. “Not quite. What I’m saying is, there’s a chance that everything Amaya Sensei told us was manufactured.”

“Huh?” Kazuki responded, his mouth agape.

“Look at how her words affected us,” Reito explained. “We’ve lost our confidence, our fighting spirit, our team unity… We’re even considering giving up on the test and becoming ninjas altogether! What if that was her intention?”

“You think Amaya Sensei might be testing us?” Yuji asked, raising a hand to his chin thoughtfully. “Hmm. I suppose it’s possible. Being a ninja does require commitment.”

“And the ability to discern fact from fiction!” Kazuki added excitedly.

Exactly!” Reito exclaimed. “I was so caught up in what she said that I almost accepted it without question! Looking back, there’s already one lie in what she said regarding our status. Either we are Genins already, and she was lying, or we aren’t, and Iruka Sensei lied to us. Either way, someone isn’t being honest, so it’s conceivable that more lies might be told.”

“But what she said about our grouping…” said Yuji.

“I know, I know, that rang true with me as well, but even if it is, it doesn’t mean that everything she said was. The best lies include elements of the truth.”

Kazuki got to his feet, looking energized. “A test with a seventy percent failure rate…? I can’t believe I fell for that!” he said, punching one hand into the other.

Reito smiled, glad to see his friend’s optimism return. “Well, there’s no way for us to know how much, if any, of Amaya Sensei’s words were true.”

Yuji stood at that moment. “Therefore, our best option is to work under the assumption that none of it was.”

“That’s right!” Reito exclaimed.

“Okay, so assuming you’re right, what’s the plan?” asked Kazuki.

“Well, you two hit on it earlier,” Reito explained. “First, whatever the reason for our grouping, it seems that we’re underdogs, but we’ve got a chance to prove ourselves tomorrow. The best way to do that is to play to our strength. Our bond!”

“I get it! It’s like Yuji said, right, we have an advantage over the other teams at this stage because we already get along?” said Kazuki.

“And we’ve even been training together,” Yuji added.

“Yep!” Reito confirmed. “We might not be the strongest, but no other team will be as coordinated as a unit as we are, and that’s the whole point of a three-man squad. Tomorrow, we’ll show Amaya Sensei our teamwork and pass her test! However many Genin spots there really are, three of them will be ours!”

***

Team Four arrived together at Training Ground Six at nine o’clock the following morning. As they had been advised, they were fully armed with ninja tools: Reito with his extra stock of shurikens, Kazuki with his bow and quiver of arrows slung over his shoulder, and Yuji with his bō staff strapped to his back. The area was a large, picturesque grassy clearing surrounded by woodland.

Their instructor was waiting for them at its center, her arms crossed, with a new toothpick in her mouth. “Oh, I wasn’t expecting to see you,” said Amaya Sensei as they approached. “I figured at least one of you would realize what a waste of time this is.”

The boys didn’t respond to this.

“Alright, well, no need to drag this out. The other Jonin make their tests into a survival exercise of sorts and give their participants the whole morning. I have no interest in chasing you around and have more important things to be getting on with, so I think an hour should be enough to see what you three can do.”

Again, the boys didn’t respond.

“It’s simple, really,” the woman explained, holding up a small sheet of red fabric, then dangled it from her waistband. “We’ll be playing a game of capture the flag. All you need to do is take this from me and have it on your waistband at the end of the time limit. Understand?”

The boys nodded.

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Their teacher looked them over suspiciously before adding, “However, there’s one more thing. On the infinitesimal chance that you weaklings can accomplish that…only the person holding onto the flag at that time will be receiving my recommendation.”

Despite this shocking piece of information, once again, the boys didn’t react, which elicited a raised eyebrow from their instructor, who then casually spat away her toothpick, looking mildly annoyed.

Reito smiled ever so slightly. The three boys had spent the previous evening preparing for today. One aspect of this included his assessment of what may arise during the test. He had listed potential tasks that they may be expected to complete, but he had considered more than just that. He had taken Amaya Sensei herself into account.

His thinking was that if they were disregarding her words from the day before, they should do the same with anything else she informed them during the test. Whether or not she had been lying when they first met, she had clearly been intent on provoking an emotional response from them, even resorting to mentioning their families. It was likely, therefore, that she would do so again, especially if it was part of a strategy to confuse or deceive them.

Reito had devised numerous scenarios based on that assumption, things that the teacher may say or do to taunt, demoralize, or divide them. Several of those scenarios had already played out, including the proposition that one or more of them may be penalized in some way. After all, Amaya Sensei had told them nine students would become Genin, not three teams, which gave her the leeway to make exactly the sort of threat she just had.

Reito’s strategy, which Kazuki and Yuji had agreed on, was to complete the test with just one thing in mind. Teamwork. There was nothing they could do about any rules or surprises Amaya Sensei may set. All they could do was complete it to the best of their ability and hope that the teacher had told some lies, and that meant working together as a unit. After all, against a Jonin-level ninja, that would be their only chance.

Arriving there, with all this in mind and an idea of what to expect, the boys were shielded from the teacher’s words as if holding powerful talismans in their pockets. Even Kazuki, who had lost his temper the previous day, was in full control of himself now.

Judging by Amaya Sensei’s noticeable surprise, Reito could see that his strategy was already paying off. Now, they just had to stick to the plan, and that hadn’t changed. In the case of a task that required recovering an object, they knew what to do.

“I warn you now, to have any chance, you’ll need to come at me with killing intent,” the teacher explained, pulling what looked like a child’s alarm clock from her pocket, fiddling with it, then placing it on the floor. “You have one hour. Begin!”

Reito checked the time on his wristwatch, then called out immediately, “Formation C!”. Right away, Kazuki reverse somersaulted away, creating a fair amount of distance between himself and the others, while Yuji stepped forward. They were now arranged in a line, with Reito in the middle. “Go!”

At this command, Yuji charged Amaya Sensei with his bō staff in hand while Reito ran to the right, and Kazuki ran to the left, surrounding the teacher from three angles but still maintaining the same distance from her and each other.

Yuji, the strongest Taijutsu user among the three, attacked. Despite his proficiency with the bō staff, which he wielded at speed, Amaya Sensei dodged his strikes effortlessly. It didn’t look like she wasn’t even trying to block. In fact, she hadn’t even uncrossed her arms. Yuji persisted, though. His job wasn’t to overpower her; it was to keep her occupied.

From the teacher’s south-westerly position, Reito began throwing a copious amount of shurikens one after the other. Doing so while an ally was engaging in close combat was dangerous, but Shuriken Jutsu was one of the few academy classes where he ranked above average, and the boys had practiced this many times.

Yuji had the kind of skill that made it possible. From his angle, he could see the incoming projectiles and adjust his attacks to account for them, if necessary, by withdrawing a step and delivering a long thrust or ducking down and striking upward.

The downside was that a skilled opponent, as Amaya Sensei apparently was, could observe his movements to predict when the shurikens were coming. She ducked and dodged many of them, but as Reito increased the number and complexity of his throws, she had to start deflecting some with the aid of a kunai. They had accounted for that, though. The gamble was that she wouldn’t be able to defend from three angles.

That was where Kazuki came in. From the teacher’s eastern flank, Kazuki was stood with an arrow notched, poised to take his shot. When Reito jumped and released a full spread of shurikens, forcing Amaya Sensei to act, it was time. Sensing the imminent danger, she landed a kick to Yuji’s chest, sending him flying, so she could focus on intercepting the five incoming projectiles with her kunai.

After deflecting two shurikens, Kazuki’s loosed arrow hit its mark, piercing the teacher’s left calf. However, the distraction caused the remaining three to hit her in the chest. This was it. They had created an opening.

Reito dashed forward but stopped abruptly when a puff of smoke issued from Amaya Sensei’s position, and two tree sections dropped to the floor with the weapons protruding from them. “The Substitution Jutsu,” he mumbled. “Defense!”

Reito and Kazuki moved to Yuji’s position with kunais at the ready, checking their half of the battlefield while the injured boy got to his feet between them. Their instructor was nowhere to be seen. Was she in the woods? Would they need to track her now? “You okay?” Reito asked him, his voice a little shaky.

“Yes, I think so, but that hurt,” he answered, rubbing his chest. “She moves so quickly. I haven’t landed a single blow.”

“I noticed,” Kazuki answered.

“Oh? What did you notice?” a female voice spoke.

Reito felt a chill run down his spine. How could she possibly have gotten between him and Kazuki? He twisted on the spot to deliver a spin kick, but the next thing he knew, he was on his back with Yuji and Kazuki lying on either side of him.

“Are we about done here, boys?” exasperated Amaya Sensei, looming over them, the red flag at her waist flapping tantalizingly in the wind. “There’s no shame in admitting defeat when facing a superior opponent. Okay, that’s not true, but it’s the only thing that might keep weaklings like you alive in the field.”

“Plan D!” Reito instructed, refusing to take the teacher’s bait. Each of the boys righted themselves with a backflip, and then, while Kazuki and Yuji engaged the teacher, Reito retrieved an item from his tool pouch and threw it down forcefully. A thick smog expanded around their location. As per the plan, the boys retreated under cover of the smoke bomb, fleeing into the woods.

The previous night, Reito had suggested the boys visit Training Ground Six ahead of their test. It was the smart thing to do for a ninja, to scope out terrain ahead of a confrontation, and Amaya Sensei didn’t say they couldn’t. During the outing, they had designated a meeting place should the need arise for one.

Within a minute, the boys had found their way out of the smokescreen and regrouped at a spot beneath a large tree, which they had marked earlier with an ‘x.’ The width of the old tree’s trunk limited enemy angles of attack, and the surrounding brush gave them some cover. From there, they could make out the clearing, where Amaya Sensei was picking up her clock to check the time.

“Alright,” whispered Reito, his heart beating fast. “We’ve laid the groundwork.”

“Do you think she’ll fall for it, though?” asked Kazuki.

“I do,” Yuji asserted. “You heard her yesterday; she’s reviewed our records. Our coordination may have surprised her, but the skills we’ve demonstrated so far are likely within her expectations.”

Reito nodded, “Agreed. We’ve shown her what she thinks we’re capable of. We’ll wait until the last ten minutes of our allotted time. Then, it’s time to show her what we can really do!”